Wednesday 18th Morning in Bed

Am in the grip of what my dad might call a filthy cold: sore throat, nose runny, and sneezing for England. I am not though, the only one. People going down like flies. Had the following homeopathic flu remedy recommended by my youngest actor last night: peel an onion, remove the inner bulb to leave a kind of cup. Fill this with honey. Place a clove of garlic in the honey. Leave overnight. Eat garlic clove in morning. Drink honey. If you have the guts, eat the onion, which tastes like death but does the world of good. If my cold does not improve today might try it tonight.

At 5.30 we had a meeting of the tecnicos. There’s not much money and Karina is concerned about managing it, with Omar her wild card. Cecilia has to create 8 costumes (one for each character in each different scene.) Which will take a large chunk of budget. Omar arrived half an hour late. He’d been swimming in the sea. Karina and I tried to pin him down to concept and budget. Omar got spikey, for the first time. Saying this wasn’t the way to do things, he couldn’t be rushed. An entertaining stand-off ensued. Of course, Omar is laid back and confident in his abilities, but he doesn’t like being under pressure, which is what has to happen now.

They left after an hour. V&F&I worked on the last scene. Did the final section with V whispering in order to explore intensity. Unfortunately, for the first time, the guys in the garage had really cranked up the volume of the cumbia they sometimes play. The quieter the scene became, the louder the music became. An exercise predicated on the quality of the silence surrounding the words was rather undermined. Nevertheless we worked through it, working out a rough blocking for the only scene which needs it.

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When I suggested the time for an interval, the technical team, and Karina, seemed a bit perturbed. I am not a fan of intervals, but this play is so damned wordy, and the middle scenes so long, that it needs one, if only of ten minutes. Karina said that only ‘los gran mega-shows’ have intervals. She asked what happened if people left at half time, to which both myself and Fernando, who’d arrived by that time, said fine, let them go. The play should run at about 1 hour 50 mins, mas o menos, which is not exactly an epic, but is apparently pushing it a bit here.

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Learnt an important technical term today. The Spanish for cue is ‘al pie’. Told V she had to be quicker on her al pies.

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